


a better man than i

by wildcard_47



Category: Downton Abbey
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-19
Updated: 2013-02-19
Packaged: 2017-11-29 20:04:29
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 963
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/690908
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wildcard_47/pseuds/wildcard_47
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Mrs. Crawley?" a voice asks, and it's one of the footmen: Alfred. "I'm sorry to interrupt, but you're needed downstairs."</p><p>Spoilers for 3x07 (the Christmas special.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	a better man than i

They take tea in the library, all smiles and sighs. Isobel and Tom are privy to the details of Edith's latest column – a follow-up to her piece on the plight of ex-soldiers. Robert and Cora, on a nearby sofa, discuss possible baby names and smile at each other like a pair of besotted teenagers. Meanwhile, at a distance, the Dowager sips her tea, interjecting her opinions into each conversation with a languid poise.

“Mrs. Crawley?” someone asks from the doorway, and it's one of the footmen, Alfred. “I'm sorry to interrupt, but you're needed downstairs at once.”

She's vaguely troubled by the look on his face, but she obliges with a smile.

“Thank you, Alfred.”

She passes Carson in the hallway. He seems not to notice her and does not slow his steps.

Mr. Bates meets her at the bottom of the staircase, with her coat, and upon glimpsing his tense expression, she begins to worry.

“You're needed at the hospital, madam,” he says. “They're bringing the car around.”

Terror blooms in her chest, but she pushes it down, forces herself to breathe.

“Is it the baby? Is it Mary?”

“No,” he replies, and with that single word, the dread claws at her heart.

“Mr. Crawley's been in an accident. You must make haste.”

His voice is too calm. It's a tone she's heard countless doctors and nurses use with terminal patients, or their next-of-kin, and it gives her chills. She spends the entire drive with her eyes squeezed shut, begging science and Reginald and God in a whispered mantra:

_Not Matthew. Not yet._

When she arrives at the hospital, a nurse whisks her upstairs to Doctor Clarkson's office, past a crowd of people in care and emergency. He's waiting for her there: visibly anxious and expression ashen, gesturing to two empty chairs near the window.

She sinks into her chair slowly, as if in a dream. He turns his back briefly to pour a small amount of whiskey into a glass, and when he faces her again it's to place the tumbler on the windowsill as he takes a seat beside her.

Oh, god. Oh, god.

“Mrs. Crawley, I'm so sorry,” he whispers.

She covers her face with her hands.

**

Mary screams and wails so violently when they tell her it takes two nurses to pin her down. From the chair by the bed, trying desperately to help soothe her daughter-in-law, Isobel only hears, rather than sees, the rest of the family arrive. Mary goes limp, looks to the door and cries out:

“Oh, Mama!”

Her next words are slurred by wracking sobs.

Cora threads gently between Isobel and the nurses, sits on the edge of the bed and cups her daughter's damp cheek with one hand.

“My darling,” she whispers, her words rushed. “I'm here. I'm so sorry.”

It's fitting, Isobel supposes, that Cora is here. God knows Mary would want her own mother to comfort her instead of a mother-in-law. Even at this hour, when their grief should be equal, it isn't. Mary's must always be loudest.

She looks away from the bed to find everyone is staring. Edith and Tom are weeping. Robert seems stunned, but fragile. Violet has an iron grip on his forearm, and leans heavily on her walking stick. Every day of her eighty-odd years is visible on her face. For a moment, she looks as burdened as Isobel feels, and Isobel has the inexplicable urge to go to her, and take up her hand. Violet has known loss. She would understand this.

It is soon followed by another, more primal urge.

_I must see him._

She gets to her feet and moves toward the east wing of the hospital, murmuring the words to herself as if in a daze. I must see him. Matthew can't be gone, I must see him.

She argues with a nurse and a young resident before Dr. Clarkson appears, and when Isobel sees her friend in the doorway the words burst from her in a rush.

He dismisses the others. They sit down on a nearby bench.

When he finally speaks, his reply is quiet and brief.

“The sight may only increase your pain,” he says roughly, casting a worried glance in her direction. “I believe you could withstand it, but I do not advise it.”

Isobel goes so far as to touch the doctor's arm, begging him to hear her, to truly understand. She has to see her little boy. She must go to him and put her hand on his chest and breathe life into his body, until his wounds knit together and his heartbeat quickens against her palm, strong and vibrant, as it did when she was carrying him so many years ago.

“Please,” she manages at last _._ “If it were your son in there, what would _you_ do?”

**

Matthew's face is marred by cuts and sickly black and purple bruises. Mud and dried blood have darkened his bright blonde hair, behind his ears and neck, and messily smear his left cheek, though someone has obviously tried to clean it off in haste. His eyes are open and unseeing – bulging – and still so terribly blue, just like his father's. She itches to close them, to wipe the mess from his brow with a damp cloth the way she did when he was a little boy. _Let's get you cleaned up._

She takes her son's too-cold hand, puts her forehead to the edge of his bed and cries until she is hollow. When the nurses return later to escort her away, Isobel is upright, her back iron-straight.

They pass the doctor in the hallway. His worried eyes search hers, and though she does not trust herself to speak, she places a hand on his arm as they pass.

**Author's Note:**

> Sheesh, I can't believe I wrote Downton fic.
> 
> Since we were denied the emotional payoff for Matthew's death in canon -- thanks a lot, Julian -- I started to wonder about the family's reactions to his loss, specifically Isobel's. She's the outsider of the Crawley clan. They never embraced her the way they did Matthew, and still don't quite understand her. Who'll know how to comfort her now? My guess was Clarkson. YMMV. If you ship Isobel/Clarkson, then squint for subtext. :)


End file.
